Age Spots: Coping with an Aging Family

In our beauty-driven society, we dislike dealing with age. There are creams, treatments, and pills you can take to try and stop its signs. But it’s happening. It’s happening as you’re reading this article—you’re aging. It seems as if this is a taboo subject in an America which would like to believe itself youthful and healthy.

The fact is no one is getting any younger. In college, we are on the precipice of being adults. We are taking on responsibilities, and that comes with starting to think about the future. Our parents and grandparents have already been at this point in the journey before us, and it is up to us to help and support them in any way we can when they need us on their spot down the road.

It can be especially difficult to deal with age when we are young—being in a young person-oriented college town like Davis, it is youth everywhere. The elderly rarely come to mind until it is time to visit the grandparents. But they need us. It is time to pay back all the care and love they have given us.

Dealing with an aging grandparent is hard—it takes a selflessness that few people possess beforehand. While hopefully you are the auxiliary rather than the vanguard, your parents at the forefront, you as the grandchild are integral to the process of making life easier for your aging loved one. This can mean many things, perhaps visiting more often, or doing yard and housework for them.

Aging is not an easy thing to witness. It is hard to see grandparents moved from their home and doing things they really would rather not. But we must be there for them, no matter what we’d rather be doing, no matter how much we hate hospitals; no matter when they need us, we must be there. It is one of the responsibilities of being an adult.